Washed

The hot breeze, pushing

Sight narrows in the salted mist, the acrid air

The sea thundering as the rolling tide retreats

The shore expanding

The empty space fills

Bodies in the sun, clamoring birds on the beach

All their waste and refuse gathering in the sand

The bones of the world

Plastic straws and paper wraps, aluminum cans

Washed out in the sun

Taken in the tide

The oceans rising, sweeping, steeping all the trash

Listen for the tide, the tide returning, the sea

Roaring in my ear

Listen for the dirge

A song for a dying world, the pipes are calling

Melodies for funerals, burials, lament

The poisoned sea

The breeze is hot, sour

The shore has putrefied, stinking with rot, cancer

Walk along the diseased shoreline, death in each step

Walk into the rising sea

Into the salted brine crying seagulls

Scattered in the waves

Into the acid bath, dissolved and disappeared

Taken in the fog